It's a Destiny 2 kind of day. The original Destiny was lauded for being one of the most expensive games every made. Being entrusted to the team of Halo fame made sense, and while Bungie haven't played a major role in the PC platform for some time, they're pulling out all the stops for Destiny's PC debut.
The original Destiny was set in its ways - both in terms of gameplay and functionality. No matter which console it was played on, the FPS stayed the same. Sure, the game looked gorgeous at higher resolutions or with more detail added within those pixels, but whether you played on a PlayStation 3 or Xbox One, you always saw the action play out in 30FPS.
Somehow, it felt absolutely fine. Even from a PC player's point of view, Destiny was an impressive console counterpart. It looked sharp and felt smooth - even at half the FPS typically deemed acceptable by the wider PC community. But its that impressive technological achievement that should have PC players foaming at the mouth. If Bungie can manage that on a console, what can they pull off on a well-specced PC?
Destiny 2 Gameplay Arrives - Certainly Looks Like Destiny
The answers are starting to come in. Though we're without a solid release window for the PC version, it was fully playable at the recent gameplay reveal event. Though the framerate was capped at a solid 60FPS, players were told it was uncapped for the most part. Meaning those 144Hz monitors can certainly be put to good use if you're able to push the framerate high enough.
Similarly, the game is confirmed to feature a FOV slider and support 21:9 ultra-widescreen aspect ratios - hardware typically neglected by most games. Of course, 4K will be properly supported, but likely a difficult feat to pull-off for those wanting that steady 60+ FPS.
Coincidentally, we're led to believe the game was demoed at the event in glorious 4K. With that rock-solid 60FPS being mentioned time and time again, we just need someone to confirm what kind of rig was being used to power the demo stations. Considering Destiny 2 doesn't look a whole lot difference from its predecessors, it could prove relatively easy for modern PC hardware to pull off that strenuous feat if you're simply looking to match the console versions in another but those two specific settings. Anti-aliasing is barely needed at 4K, so there's something to save from that.
As for the usual settings you'd expect a PC version to contain, we'll just have to wait and see. Resolution, framerate and aspect ratio are all but confirmed at this point; but things like texture quality, filtering, ambient occlusion, particle density and all those other interesting little switches and sliders remain a mystery for now.
That being said; hopes are high. The PC version has given faith to those lucky enough to go hands-on. Here's hoping the momentum sticks and we're presented with a polished product capable of running on a variety of hardware specifications.
We're likely not getting cross-platform play thanks to uncapped framerates and mouse/keyboard control, so we'll need all the players we can get. Running through the Blizzard App is a bonus. Those who were afraid of installing an Activision branded content delivery platform needn't worry any longer. Those without a Blizzard game, though? You'll join the rest of us soon.
